HP&THBP 16180339887
by TereseaFae
Summary: Two years after the Final Battle, Harry Potter receives an unexpected and rather unwanted letter amidst his already tumultuous life. He embarks upon a new quest, this time a more deeply interpersonal one as he blazes a trail down what's left of Severus Snape's memory lane. Is he truly ready for his parents', or more accurately, Severus Snape's history?
1. Chapter 1 - Harry Receives a Letter

**I**

Harry Receives a Letter

HARRY Potter was not quite sure what to do after he read the letter in his hands. He felt rather nauseous, in fact. He remembered a time, some eight odd years or so ago (Merlin's bollocks, had it been that long already?) when he had stood just like this - hand-scrawled letter in hand, feeling outright sick to the stomach with this warm, sloshing anticipation. However this letter was from a different Headmaster of Hogwarts than the one who had sent him his letter as an eleven-year-old boy. Very different indeed.

Harry's stomach somersaulted sickeningly.

Severus Snape had been dead for nearly two years and yet here Harry was receiving a letter from the old bat.

_As if it were yesterday_, he thought.

He shuddered, but decided to read the letter over again, just to make sure he had read it correctly, just to make sure it was real.

**Mr. Potter,**

** I trust you've been taking care of my small amalgamation of memories (if not, in fact, coveting them like the emotional hoarder you are). In anticipation of your bottomless desire for personal history and your highly agitating talent for nosing about, I decided I'd save you the trouble of having to go through my (now former) possessions willy-nilly in search of answers...or more memories. **

**Thusly, I am providing you with the key to my (re, former) abode on Spinner's End, located in Cokeworth (it's the last one on the street, you can't bloody miss it, even with eyesight as poor as yours probably is). I have also included the password incantation to unlock the wards still surrounding the premises (which, if your aforementioned talent got the better of you, you have already discovered. My condolences - apply liberal amounts of dittany in the event of burns.). **

**The remainder of the instructions await within the house itself.**

** ~ Severus Snape**

**P.S. Try not to think too hard when speaking the provided incantation (gods forbid you injure that already inflated head of yours) - it should come naturally...perhaps much like riding a broom did for you (the other only real talent you possess).**

Yeah. It was real all right - cryptic instructions emblazoned with chiding remarks about Harry's character. And there was no mistaking that hard, spidery writing (to him it would always be the Prince's writing first)"; this letter had definitely been written by Snape himself. And yet, it was indeed no less an invitation. An invitation into the private life -

And suddenly his stomach decided that it was lost somewhere on the high sea; it gave a rolling lurch and Harry doubled over over the wastebasket.

"Harry?"

Harry wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, tossed the letter onto the table, and then walked over to the sink. He washed his hands as Ginny leaned against the kitchen doorway.

"Is everything alright?"

_Alright? The teacher who hated me the most sent me a letter two years after I saw him die!_ He took a moment to scrutinize the herbs Molly had hung there that morning before answering. "Of course I'm alright. I think I'm going to go see Ron. Can you get the Floo Powder?" He dried his hands slowly, giving some rosemary a good stare-down.

He felt Ginny pause momentarily and he knew that she was eyeing the letter on the table but then she Disapparated with a smart _crack_ and in a moment Harry could hear the distinct roar of fire in the fireplace.

He took a deep breath...

and pivoted on his foot, snatched the letter and its envelope from the kitchen table, and walked into the Weasley's living room. Ginny was standing by the fireplace, aglow with the dancing luminescent green flames flickering within it. She looked rather grim, but he couldn't blame her for that, not right now.

"Thanks, Ginny," Harry said. He gave her a kiss then placed the letter securely in an inside pocket of his jacket.

Ginny's eyes followed the letter and then returned themselves back to Harry's. "Mum's got dinner planned tonight," she said. "Tell Ron for me. If, you know, get the chance to that is - or I'll send her myself." She flashed a mischievous, but knowing smile.

Harry loved her more than anything in that moment and chuckled in spite of the heavy pit in his stomach. "We'll try to be here," he said and stepped into the fireplace.

* * *

><p>"BLOODY hell, Harry, you have to warn me or something before you just pop over like this," complained Ron, pulling a shirt over his head as he walked into the living room from a bedroom in the back.<p>

"I did - I used the Floo Network," Harry mumbled.

"Is that Harry?" came the voice of Hermione from down the hall.

"Yeah, it's me." Harry flashed a grin. "Sorry, mate," he said as Ron sat down on the couch. "But it was urgent."

"It better be," said Ron. "What is it?"

"As soon as Hermione gets in here I'll tell you both."

"Hermione! It's urgent!" Ron yelled over his shoulder.

Hermione stepped into the living room, wearing a dark blue bathrobe, her brown curls frizzy and her face flushed. "Ron, of course it's urgent, otherwise Harry wouldn't have just popped up like this." She turned to Harry. "Harry! It's so good to see you!" They embraced, and Harry was glad that he had come by - the pit in his stomach was easing slightly in the presence of his dearest friends. Hermione plopped down next to Ron on the couch and Harry took a seat opposite them in a big, comfortable-looking chair.

Harry decided that it would be best to just dive right in. "You won't believe this-"

"Oh, try us, Harry," said Ron with a grin.

Harry chuckled. He swallowed once and pulled just the letter from inside his jacket, keeping the envelope in the pocket against his chest. He could feel the weight of the key he had yet to examine next to his thumping heart. He took a breath. "Well, I got this letter today from...well, it's from Snape." He held it out for them.

Hermione's eyes lit up with such fierce intrigue Harry couldn't help but smile. She reached out and took the letter, assuming her analytic reading position. Ron said, "Snape? But he's dead," and frowned.

"I know, that's the weird thing," said Harry, shuddering slightly at the recollection of being witness to Snape's gruesome death. His mouth felt dry. "It's like this letter was written yesterday or something, but I know it's not. And I definitely know it's really from him."

Hermione finished reading and then passed the parchment to Ron, who skimmed it over, eyes wide.

"Is there really a way to do that?" asked Hermione breathlessly, eyes twinkling, full of wonder. "Is there really a way to leave someone another's memories? I mean, memories will deteriorate over time and I didn't even know that they could exist after the person passes..."

Harry thought about the vial of Snape's memories that he still had. He could picture it clearly, stowed in the back of his sock drawer, wrapped up in his ugliest pair of socks.

He had gone back and collected the memories from the Pensieve after the Final Battle telling himself the whole way to Dumbledore's office (he would forever call it that, even though it had been Snape's at that time) that he only wanted the memories, even if he couldn't view them without the Pensieve, because, in a way, they had been his mother's memories, too.

But as time wore on, Harry couldn't help but wonder more and more about who exactly Snape was. The memories, while they shed light on a number of mysteries about Severus Snape, had, in fact, only raised more questions in Harry's mind. Perhaps he would even go so far as to say he still loathed the man, even after knowing the truth. What was more, often in the dead of night, Harry would remove the vial from its hiding place to just hold it and stare at it. Over time, he did begin to notice a change in its coloration and the swirling seemed to have slowed, but as far as Harry could tell, Snape's memories were still...alive.

To answer Hermione's question with these musings meant Harry would have to tell both Hermione and Ron that he had kept the memories and he still was not ready to give full disclosure on those memories nor was he ready to open up about his feelings surrounding the events shown to him...not to mention he didn't want to go into his feelings about Snape the man himself. _I mean, _I _don't even want to explore those feelings and - _

"You alright, mate?"

Harry couldn't help but give a smile as he caught Hermione elbowing Ron. "Yeah, I mean...for the most part, yeah."

Ron nodded, glaring at Hermione, and looked back at the parchment still in his hand. His brow furrowed.

"What?" said Harry.

Ron looked up at him. "Why would Snape wait _two years after_ he died to send this to you?"

Before Harry could stop himself, "Because he's just that much of a prick," tumbled from his mouth. He averted his eyes from his friends. "Or at least he was to me," he mumbled.

Hermione's soothing voice met his ears in the shape of his name. He glanced at her as she leaned forward. She said, "He only acted that way - well, based on what you've told me -"

Now it was Ron elbowing Hermione but Harry wasn't finding it very funny anymore. Insides now bubbling, he jumped up out of his chair and began to pace back and forth in front of them. Distantly, he heard himself fervently saying, "But that's _exactly_ it, Hermione! Don't you see?! Snape spent practically his _whole life_ working to _protect me _and he _hated _every moment of it because _I_ was the product of the person he most despised and the only person he actually ever loved! So, _of course_, he never missed an opportunity to take his messed up feelings out on me!"

Ron and Hermione could only stare at him.

Harry sighed, removed his glasses, cleaned them on his shirt and then returned them to his face. "I just-" he swallowed. "I just can't help _wondering_, y'know? Wondering _why_... I can't help feeling-" he paused. When he spoke again, his voice had dropped to a whisper, "I can't help feeling that there's something - something _more_ about the whole thing." Remarkably, his insides were finally beginning to settle.

There was a beat of silence.

"Well, pardon me for being blunt, but, seems to me like the way forward is pretty clear," Ron stated matter-of-factly.

Harry could have kicked him. Instead, he laughed, and genuinely this time. Ron stood up now and made his way next to Harry, holding Snape's letter out to him. Harry took it wordlessly, folded it up and stowed it back inside his jacket.

"I guess I don't really know why I came here," Harry said lamely, feeling exactly that.

Ron grasped his shoulder, grinned, and said, "Do you need me to show you to the door?"

Harry couldn't tell if Ron was referring to the door here or Spinner's End - he decided it was both. He grinned back. "No, I - I think I've got this one."

Ron sighed in mock relief. "That's good - I really didn't want to go into Snape's house; it's probably full of spiders." A shudder passed over him.

This time Harry did kick him but he, Ron, and Hermione laughed; young kids together again, if just for a moment.

* * *

><p>The fireplace was merrily crackling again, fluorescent green flames licking and dancing on the walls; Harry was preparing to step through it to Grimmauld Place for a few things before heading on to his more dismal destination.<p>

"Oh!" he said and turned around.

"What is it?" asked Hermione.

"I nearly forgot - Ron, your mum's got dinner planned tonight and she expects you two to be there."

Ron groaned. "And what about you?"

"I'm not going, of course."

"Oh, mum's gonna be pissed at you -"

"So will Ginny -" chimed Hermione.

"Just tell them something came up," Harry replied a little gruffly. He turned to the fireplace again but suddenly a recklessness, an inspiration seized him. Harry spun around. "Don't!"

Ron and Hermione jumped.

"Don't what?!"

"Don't tell anyone what I'm doing...about Snape."

"What should we tell them, then?" Hermione asked a little gruffly in return.

"I dunno, make something up - if family or friends ask, I'm just off on Ministry bullshit. You know how it is...tied up with one thing or another, blessing babies and stuff...but if it's anyone from the Ministry, just tell them I'm on holiday. But don't you dare say a word about this Snape business! To anyone!"

Hermione and Ron exchanged another look between them. Not that it was the first time, but Harry felt like they were questioning his sanity. He was beginning to doubt it himself when Ron said, "You got it, mate. But let us know if you need anything at all."

Satisfied, Harry nodded, stepped back into the fireplace, and then barked, "Number 12 Grimmauld Place!"


	2. Chapter 2 - A New Quest

**II**

A New Quest

GRIMMAULD Place was dead quiet when Harry stepped out of the fireplace and into the large drawing room. The late afternoon sun was filtering through the shuttered windows and Harry could see dust motes floating like dainty, dreamy snowflakes in and out of the rays of light.

"Kreacher?" he asked aloud, but not too loudly for the silence was grating on him like a foreboding shadow (that and he still had not yet removed the portrait of Sirius' mother). Looking around his inherited home, he realized he hadn't been here in days (or maybe weeks?), usually spending what free time he did have these days with Ginny (when she also had time away from practices and games) at The Burrow, which was always bustling with warmth, action and good food, unlike _here_.

Suddenly there was a little _pop!_ and his wizened house-elf stood hunched before him. He was wrinklier, looking more like a pile of old than ever, his garb was his usual tattered and dirtied potato-sack-loin-cloth getup but with the addition of Regulus Black's locket hanging from his neck, swinging softly like a pendulum from the house-elf's recent Apparition.

"Master has returned," the stooped and gnarled creature before him said, giving him a wily look.

"Yes, but unfortunately only for a short while again. I'll be needing provisions for a week - I'm going away...on...business...a business holiday. Can you manage that? Please?" Harry waited for Kreacher to take action. When the house elf continued to stare at him, unmoving, Harry began to feel both a wee bit agitated and anxious. "Kreacher, did you hear me?"

"Kreacher does not agree with Master's request," the elf croaked out while nodding his head.

"What? Why?"

Kreacher grinned. "Kreacher thinks it better to pack two weeks of provisions - Master asked Kreacher a week and a half ago to prepare his things to be gone one week but Master was gone for longer and Kreacher wondered how Master was eating. Kreacher doesn't like being lied to. Kreacher will pack things for two weeks plus some extra, just in case." And with that, the house elf Disapparated and Harry could hear commotion in the kitchen.

"Well," said Harry, "alright then." Then he himself Disapparated to his own room. Once there, a cozy, solitary little room, he went straight for his sock drawer in the ornately carved ancient rosewood dresser, complete with the Black family crest.

It wasn't as if he was particularly fond of the crest itself or anything but more of the combined craftsmanship and functionality of the thing itself - it was a beautiful piece of art that just happened to function as a magical dresser.

So knowing, somehow, that he needed the vial of Snape's memories before he even set foot in Spinner's End, Harry automatically reached for the back of the sock drawer, which had opened at the mere thought of opening it. He grasped those ugly, coarse, grey socks (given him by Aunt Petunia for Christmas all those years ago) and pulled them out, unwrapping them gingerly over the still open drawer. The little cork-stoppered vial fell into his open palm and it sent shivers up and down his spine. It was cold, like it had been kept over ice and it felt immensely heavy. Really, Harry himself felt immensely heavy. Yet, at the same time, Harry felt exhilarated.

He thought that he was through with adventuring after defeating Voldemort, which had been quite a relief to him then. But as time wore on, Harry began to miss those dangerous escapades. He had tried to quell that wanderlust by immersing himself as an Auror in the shenanigans of the Ministry, but that, though, just seemed to consume his time more than anything and Harry had distinctly noticed himself becoming more and more reclusive and withdrawn as his need for adventuring wasn't satisfied. It was beginning to wear on his relationships, especially with Ginny.

Actually, now that he thought about it, staring at that chilly vial of swirling pearlessence, Harry realized that all his unrest really began while lobbying for Severus Snape's portrait to be hung in the Headmaster's office at Hogwarts. He recalled thinking then, _I vehemently defend this man above all outward reason and yet, in my very bones, I still hate him._

Harry had said as much to Ron and Hermione today (but it felt like days ago) and while admitting it openly (finally) did lighten the load a bit, it was still no less true, especially now.

Harry continued to stare at the vial resting in his palm.

He could pay a visit to dear old Hogwarts and demand an explanation from Snape's portrait - he had succeeded in having the portrait hung there - but he had never spoken to it and rather wanted to keep it that way.

_Besides_, a voice he hadn't heard in a long time said somewhere inside himself, _besides, you wouldn't want to cut corners in a quest._

_ I do know a thing or two about quests_, Harry thought with a little smile.

Suddenly his exhilaration mounted and took off. His hand closed around the vial. Deja vu-like memories of catching Snitches flashed in his mind and suddenly Harry felt a blissful sense of purpose, of direction; the dawning of a new quest. And he thought, _This is what I've been waiting for._

Kreacher appeared with a _pop_ that startled Harry out of his reverie. He quickly pocketed the vial, storing it with the other quest items - Snape's letter and the envelope with the key to the last house on Spinner's End.

"Kreacher has finished packing Master's food," the old house elf croaked out, levitating a large satchel down to the ground.

"Thanks, Kreacher." Harry thought his own voice sounded rather frog-like; it certainly was very dry.

Kreacher wobbled forward a few paces to the middle of the room and clapped his gnarly hands above his head. Everywhere in the room that Harry stored his articles of clothing opened up and out flew all of Harry's wearables - he couldn't say there was much (the rest were probably at the Burrow in Ginny's room) but Harry honestly didn't think he'd be gone an entire week; quest it was, but how long could viewing some leftover memories really take?

"Kreacher, don't worry about the amount of clothes - that will do, really. Thank you." Harry found an old school satchel under the bed and shoved all his clothes into it.

Kreacher just stood there, looking rather miffed with his skinny arms akimbo.

Ready (and rather antsy) to leave, Harry was about to dismiss Kreacher when Harry caught sight of Regulus Black's locket around Kreacher's neck. An inspiration seized him suddenly.

"Kreacher, did Master Regulus know a fellow Slytherin and half-blood by the name of Severus Snape?"

"Oh, Kreacher knew Mister Severus, yes - a right snake was he. Mistress could never make up her delicate mind about that particular snake, oh no." Kreacher took a seat on the floor. Harry joined him.

"Snape was sometimes here when Grimmauld Place was so graciously allowed use by the Order, but did he ever come here before then, like when he and Master Regulus were at Hogwarts, perhaps? I know this is kind of difficult territory for you to talk about, but can you try to remember?" Harry asked. Part of him felt that this was a waste of time and he just needed to be going on to Spinner's End, but he truly, in his heart, felt that Kreacher had something of significance to say on this matter.

Kreacher nodded his head. "Sure, sure - Mister Severus came 'round for a few holidays while Master was at school. It tormented Sirius, the nasty curr, so much that Mistress let the dirty half-blood stay in her beloved home. He stayed in this room, actually, while he visited - it was the closest guest room to Master Regulus' room. When he did stay here during the days of the Order, which was quite infrequently, he used this room, same as he did when he was younger."

"This same room?" Harry asked, incredulous, wary. Kreacher nodded. Harry looked around his chosen bedroom with a kind of newfound interest. He had been drawn to this particular room for some reason but he certainly would not have chosen it purely out of an unconscious connection to Snape...wouldn't he? _Gross._ Harry had to cut his musings short as his house elf began speaking again.

"Kreacher was a better spy than Mister Severus - Kreacher would often spy on _him_ - of course Kreacher would, Mister Severus was a half-blood in Mistresses' home - Kreacher came to know much about the venomous snake." There was a mischievous grin on Kreacher's wrinkly face that was mildly unsettling to Harry, but also quite intriguing.

Harry ventured forth with another question. "What did Kreacher find out about Snape?"

Kreacher's grin became rather nasty and insidious and Harry felt his stomach drop in anticipation.

"Nasty, nasty man. Mister Severus the snake was very active at night. Always sneaking or slithering around the grounds with one of those nasty Muggle smoke sticks they put in their mouths, he was. Many nasty habits, and they all came out at night. He'd hide his personal material under the bed - there's a loose floorboard under there. Kreacher found all sorts of pictures and letters and other trinkets that were intimately special to Mister Severus."

Harry jumped up and moved next to his bed. He lifted the bed skirt and peered beneath it. "Are those things Snape left still here?"

Kreacher stood up as well. "No," he said. Harry sighed, crestfallen. This was a waste of time. But then Kreacher said, "Kreacher has those things elsewhere."

"Really?" Harry jumped up for the second time. "Kreacher, can you bring those things to me? Anything and everything that he left?"

The ancient creature nodded his head, Disapparated, and in no more than thirty seconds' time, Apparated back into the bedroom, a small paper sack in his hands.

"Mister Severus was always looking for these things, especially in the days of the Order. Tore the place apart like a wild dog, looking for these. Couldn't even prove Kreacher had them. But anyone not a pureblood had to give something to the Black residence if they were to stay in the Noble House of Black. Since Mister Severus is dead, Kreacher has no use for these anymore." The elf handed the small bag to Harry.

Harry decided not to comment on nor chastise the elf for stealing trinkets - it was the creature's habit (but he had also relinquished the cherished objects). And what was more important was that Harry had some more clues to add to his current stash in his jacket pocket. With trembling hands, Harry opened the paper parcel and removed the small stack of parchment and photos. He could still feel a small weight in the bag but decided that he would investigate whatever was left in there after looking through the photos and letters. Harry set the bag on his lap for safekeeping and turned over the first thing on top of the stack in his hands.

Harry's heart gave an electrifying jolt.

He was staring at a Muggle photograph of his mother, who could not have been older than thirteen. She was smiling from laughter, her freckled nose wrinkled in endearing mirth, wind stirring her fiery red hair - even though the photograph did not move, there was an overwhelming sense of movement and life captured. It was a beautiful photograph. He didn't want to stop looking at it.

Eventually he did and set it down on the floor next to his leg. Harry turned his attention to the stack in his hands again. There was scrawled, in girlish, bubbly writing, "_Best Friends Forever_." It had to be his mother's handwriting. Harry turned it over.

It was another Muggle photograph, this one showing both his mother and Severus Snape. They were very young, probably about ten or just nearing eleven. His mother was beaming brightly with her little red head leaning towards Snape, whom she had her arms around. Snape's head was bowed, his oil-black hair throwing half of his face into shadow, but he had a genuine-looking little half smile on his lips and one arm slung over Lily (the other one was shoved in the pocket of his large, heavy coat).

While the first photograph had filled him with a kind of sorrowful joy, this second one filled Harry with a very strange, twisting-of-the-gut feeling. In this photograph, Harry could tell that the two children deeply cared for one another and were virtually inseparable (he had a similar Wizard photograph of himself, Ron, and Hermione). Yet the two children in this photo were as different as night and day. How did Snape and his mother become friends, and such close friends? Harry had wondered that since he had seen the memories right after Snape's death. He set the photo on the floor with the other one and turned over the next thing on the stack.

It was a folded bit of parchment, addressed to "Sev", clearly a letter.

For some reason, Harry got this sick feeling in his stomach holding this letter. He could feel there was something folded between the sheaves of parchment; another photograph, perhaps.

"That's one the filthy half-blood only took out at night," sneered Kreacher in his bullfrog voice, seeming to sense Harry's hesitation.

That made Harry not want to open the letter even more. Yet he did. The folded parchment came apart slowly, in patches, as if something sticky had been spilled on the inside. His insides squirmed even more. He finally opened the letter to its whole and indeed there was a picture inside.

He didn't look at this one for very long - it was his about-fourteen-year-old mother in a very modern-looking two-piece swimsuit. He caught snippets of the letter -_ too bad you didn't come to the sea with me like I asked you too, I've included a photo of my new swimsuit; I think it's rather mature - so Petunia hates it!_ - that just jostled his sick feeling uncomfortably so he didn't even read it all the way through.

Utterly disgusted beyond any tangible reason, Harry quickly folded the photo back within the letter, stacked the remaining things in his hands on top of the photographs on the floor and shoved them into his pocket with the other things from Snape.

_Who's supposed to be dead, not sending people on wild goose chases._

Perhaps he should ignore this altogether.

What did he need to see any more of Snape's life and memories for?

Hadn't he seen and done enough?

"No - this is only another part."

"What is, Master?"

Apparently Harry had said that aloud. He found himself unable to hold back his thoughts. "I've been dallying around the bloody Ministry, ignoring my loved ones, walling myself off even from myself all because I haven't had a direction since the War, which messed me up enough as it was! And Snape - of all people! - has the...the _audacity_ to send me down _his_ messed-up memory lane probably knowing full well that I'm just _dying _to have another crazy adventure...

"You know what? Fine! I'll go to Snape's stupid house! I've nothing better to do anyway."

Red-faced, Harry stood up. He gathered his things - the sack of food and his satchel of meager clothes - and faced his house elf.

The creature was grinning.

"What's so funny?" blurted Harry.

"Good luck at the Prince's abode, Master," Kreacher said.

That sent chills down Harry's spine, for sure. Not wanting to know how his house elf knew Snape was related to the Princes, he spun around and stormed out of the room, down the stairs, and out the front door whereupon he Apparated right out of the front walkway and on to Spinner's End, Cokeworth.


	3. Chapter 3 - The Prince's Humble Abode

**III**

The Prince's Humble Abode

APPARITION always made Harry quite dizzy. He stood for a moment staring at the cracked cement beneath his feet, getting his bearings back and his faculties functioning normally before he took his surroundings in. It didn't take too long and soon his eyes were roving over a dilapidated, dingy, near-deserted spread of outdated brick houses with an old factory chimney looming on the hazy grey horizon. Harry himself happened to be on a street corner near a small, gross-smelling brook, which wended its way on his left and on towards another grouping of slightly nicer houses.

Harry began to recognize the area from the memories he had witnessed of his mother and Snape as children, although the years had made the area itself worse for wear. The rusted, crooked street sign did, in fact, read "Spinner's End".

Being on the correct street, Harry decided that the only way to go was forward and so forward he went. He began to wonder, after passing what had to be the seventh-or-so boarded-up house, if anything still lived in these sad little dwellings at all anymore.

Not that he was worried about being seen or anything (he was usually most comfortable in Muggle jeans and t-shirt anyway) but he found the lack of people rather comforting, oddly enough. At least he felt that no-one was going to bother him about anything he was or wasn't doing here.

Here, he was only here for one thing, a thing of his own choosing again, with no-one to bother him except the memory of a dead man.

Harry felt the house before he actually saw it. For a dead wizard's house, the levels of magic were still immensely powerful. Harry could tell which house was his former Professors' purely by the magic it radiated though, true to his word, the Potions Master's' house was indeed the very last house on the street, which ended into a patch of trees through which Harry could glimpse an empty lot surrounded by chain-link and a bit of old church or factory in the background (it was hard to be sure which it was, everything had the same dull grey and washed-out brick-red hue).

Harry turned his attention to the house he had now approached, stopping at the tiny walkway to the front door to adjust the feather-light bags on his shoulder. It was quite a foreboding house - the small second-story windows bored down darkly onto him as his Potions Professor's eyes had done and the gnarled oak that stood sentinel to the house loomed over him menacingly, bringing to mind that fume-induced anxiety over hot, bubbling cauldrons.

Truly nothing compared to, say, a basilisk, but none-the-less Harry's stomach felt queasy again. He clenched his teeth and treaded down the path.

Due to this bout of nervousness, he almost forgot about the wards (and to think he was a trained Auror!); he stopped himself just before he ran into them (invisible though they were but their magic felt a tad prickly due to the age of the spell). Harry now pulled the envelope with the key and the page with the ward-unlocking incantation in it out of his inside jacket pocket. He took the piece of paper out of the envelope and looked at what was written there.

Harry groaned.

Of course the old bat would have an essay-long dissertation for Harry to read through before he could even enter the stupid house! And of course Harry had not even bothered to look at these "instructions" before he left on this adventure.

Harry suddenly wished Hermione were here.

Sighing, Harry accepted his fate and skimmed over the parchment until he found a stand-alone Latin phrase:

**Amor et melle et felle est fecundissimus**.

This had to be the incantation (trust Snape to pick a whole sentence instead of a compound word). Harry now scanned for an explanation on wand movement.

**There is no need for foolish wand-waving - this particular incantation merely utilizes the projection of the will, being the speaker is pure of heart and intention.**

_Pure of heart and intention?_ Harry thought that this was a strange concept to associate with Snape...and not to mention a ward-unlocking spell. But the longer he puzzled over it, somehow the more it made sense.

_And doesn't "amor" mean "love"?_ He was sure it did, but Harry couldn't translate out the rest of the Latin and he didn't feel like bothering to do so at the moment (again he wished Hermione were here).

He took another cursory glance over the rest of the instructions and garnered the gist of how to unlock the wards surrounding Snape's house; it was basically just carefully directed wandless magic. Pocketing the parchment, he faced the walkway head-on and squared his shoulders.

He wouldn't claim to be the best at wandless magic, but he could do it, as long as he directed the stream of magical energy through his hand (soon he would master wandless magic without having to use his hands at all, like other witches and wizards of advanced skill). At least it wasn't nonverbal, as well.

Harry cleared his mind of all current noise and allowed his "pure intentions" of the situation to come forth: _I am here by permission of the master of these premises; I come bearing no ill will (or at least with as little resentment as I can honestly muster up); I seek the truth_. For good measure he raised his wand-arm up, palm vertically aligned with the barrier, which was glimmering visibly due to his connecting with the magic within and around himself. When the feeling of connectivity seemed harmonious, and he could more clearly see the glimmering of the wards, Harry then softly, albeit firmly spoke the "incantation", "_Amor et melle et felle est fecundissimus!_"

The translucence of the barrier undulated a few times before finally bursting like a blister at the top and then it began to melt like hot beeswax. Harry kept firm his concentration lest he was forced to begin breaking the spell all over again, which would take more energy than it was worth.

With one last final push of magic through his palm, the ward disappeared with a small _sizzle_. The surrounding air immediately felt more open, less strained, but vulnerable, too. Distantly behind him, he heard a car's door being shut and he was glad he had finished his job quickly. So Harry took a cautious step forward and when he was met with no resistance, he squared his shoulders and walked on down the path and to the entryway of the dismal brick house.

A shudder passed up his spine as he crossed the last step onto the wooden porch. But none-the-less Harry pulled the key out from his inside jacket pocket. He examined it for the first time since receiving it, standing on the tiny and horribly slanted landing of the last house on Spinner's End. The key was large, old fashioned, and looked like the silhouette of a moose facing you front-on. Harry was reminded of Divination, but could not for the life of him remember what a moose represented as an omen. He shrugged his shoulders and almost got the key shoved in the keyhole when a suit-clad man approached him saying, "Oh thank God that someone is _finally_ here!"

The man was obviously a Muggle. It wasn't just his garb nor the habit of exclaiming to a debatably existent deity that gave it away, Harry just had a pretty good eye for this sort of thing now.

"Er, and you are?"

"Oh, do excuse me! My name is Russell Slater, and I am the Solicitor assigned to take over Mr. Snape's Last Will and Testament as the courts could not get in contact with the named executor." Russell Slater extended his hand stiffly.

Harry grasped it. "Harry Potter, er, Private Investigator." Which was about a stone's throw away from the truth as far as how the Aurors operated these days.

Slater the Solicitor gripped Harry's hand more tightly. "I had a weird hunch, a lucky feeling today when I left my office to come here." Harry's stomach dropped. The man's eyes were shining in a way that was eliciting an anxiousness in Harry. "It felt a little crazy, driving all the way out here on just a lucky feeling, I'll admit, but the stars must be right because not only do I run into _someone here_ but I run into the _named executor himself_! It is very splendid to finally meet you, Mr. Potter!" And with one final stiff squeeze, he let go of Harry's hand and lapsed into small talk. "Did you hear about that Y2K problem that the Americans were all head over heels about? 'Lotta nutters 'cross the water."

"Er, yeah," Harry airily replied, having no clue what nonsense this Y2K problem was and having never been to the United States himself. He felt a little dazed and confused, but mostly relieved that the man hadn't known who he was really.

"Well, I suppose we ought to get to business, then!" Slater said and began rifling through his briefcase. "I just have a few documents for you to sign and then I'll answer any questions you have about, well, executing. Do you have any identification on you, Mr. Potter?"

"Er, yeah," Harry said again, fishing around in his back pocket for his Auror-issued ID card. Harry showed it to Mr. Slater, who squinted briefly and then nodded his head after the card showed him whatever necessary form of identification he needed to see. Harry stashed the card back into his pocket as Mr. Slater thanked him and bent down to rifle through his briefcase for some documents.

The situation suddenly dawned upon Harry. _I thought Snape was crazy, but leaving me all his possessions and entrusting me with the care of his 'estate'...?_ "Why would he name _me_ the executor?"  
>A brief silence from Mr. Slater and then a curt inclination of his head as he said, "Were you not close with Mr. Snape?"<p>

Apparently Harry had said his thoughts aloud again. He sighed, "...he was only my Professor..."

Mr. Slater looked around their surroundings. "Oh? What on Earth did he teach?"

"Er, at the _police academy_, which is where I went to _school_ before becoming a _Private Investigator, y'know_, he taught...chemistry...and, er, self-defense..." Harry knew he still needed work on his exposition, but now was not the time to nitpick proper form when dealing with the Muggle Public in an Auror undercover-type situation!

"And who would've thought, living here... It always fascinates me, little pieces of past people's past... Now, if you would just sign these documents relinquishing the will to you..." Here he flopped a stack of documents in front of Harry's face.

_The will?!_ Harry's heart began to beat uncontrollably. He wasn't prepared for _this_! He was just supposed to come here to view some left-over memories in a long-forgotten deserted Muggle house! Inheriting the Snape Estate was not something he had ever thought or imagined or hoped for! Not ever! Not even in his nightmares!

But the man had left it to him, Harry.

Kreacher's words flitted through his mind, "Good luck at the Prince's abode, Master." Harry looked around the humble surroundings and something twinged in his heart...

...and so he grabbed the papers and the proferred ballpoint-pen out of Mr. Slater's hands and began just signing away on the documents.

"The only thing is," Mr. Slater said.

"What's that?" Harry asked, wary of the hesitation he heard in the man's voice.

"The only thing is, I have no key. There wasn't one left with the Solicitor's Office... terribly sorry for that slip-up but you must understand my cause for urgency in your signing of these documents here...I mean, this has been left in my care for over two years and frankly -"

"Don't worry, sir, Snape actually left one with me. I just had, er, forgotten about it; y'know how sometimes the post can get mixed in with the ads and magazines lying around, eh?"

Slater the Solicitor looked immensely relieved. "You're a true hero, Mr. Potter."

"I get that a lot."

"I bet you do in your line of work!"

There was a moment of awkward foot shuffling.

"Well, then! If you're done signing away on those, I'll just have a little look-over and then we can both be about our merry business!" Mr. Slater cleared his throat as Harry returned to him the stack of documents. The manner in which Slater looked them over nearly screamed, 'The Nagging of the Boss and Wife Shall Finally Come to Rest and I Shall Have Peace Once Again!" The man tore off the yellow paper copies to hand to Harry as fast as he could, which wasn't that fast as the man had to flip to each page and tear it out and then hand it to Harry individually. Harry had to stifle his laughter throughout the whole ordeal.

Once all the copies had been transferred to Harry, Slater asked, "Before I depart, do you have any questions? The documents themselves ought to outline what possessions goes to whom and whatnot, but I can answer anything general for you. Speaking of documents!" He reached down and pulled out a thick scroll from his briefcase. "Funny way to write one's will, but I've seen worse - at least it's not on a napkin!" He held it out. Harry took it.

"So, any last questions?" Slater prompted.

_Only if you could tell me why Snape left _me_ all _his_ stuff_, Harry thought. To Slater he said, "No, I think I can manage from here. ...Thank you for your persistence on this, I'm sure it wasn't easy holding onto this for so long."

"Just doing my duty! Anyways, good day! Nice meeting you! Take care!" And with a last curt wave, Slater the Solicitor scuttled off the crooked porch and back down the road to his car.

The air felt heavy with the quiet that settled in after the car rumbled to life and drove off around the corner and out of sight. Alone again, and again with another stack of stuff from dead Snape, Harry wasted no more time in shoving the old key into the keyhole and turning the handle.

The door swung open with a creak that could have had its own debut in a horror flick. Harry flinched on principle. And true to Ron's forecast, at least five spiders scuttled out from inside the dark entryway and onto the porch. Harry had a good laugh then, imagining Ron at his side whimpering in thinly veiled disgust and horror.

The laugh dissipated, seemingly into the darkness of the threshold before him. He poked at the door a little with his foot, nudging it open ever so slightly. A musky scent wafted out from the wider slit, something old and threadbare, something spicy yet musty, something Harry could almost place, like when a word was just on the tip of your tongue but you couldn't quite grasp it for the life of you.

Harry Potter stepped over the threshold and into Severus Snape's former house.

"_Lumos_", whispered Harry. His wand tip lit up the room before him in a soft blue-white light.

"Hermione would feel right at home here," he said aloud, just because; the little sitting room looked like it was trying to be a grand library in what little space it could manage with as it was packed with layer upon layer (Harry could see double layers of books on some shelves) of books on shelves with only a couple pieces of furniture in the entire room. Strangely enough, Harry himself felt right at home here!

It was perhaps the same thing as when he had set foot in the Weasley's place the first time - it was cluttered with objects and nick-nacks and always had a distinct smell; or perhaps it was when he went to Hermione's parent's place for the first and nearly only time - it was well-put together, very prim and proper but with an air of homey comfortability; it was perhaps even the same thing with the Dursley's place - though he hated it and the people who owned it, it had a certain homey-ness to it in its preciseness, not to mention the familiarity it had, despite his hatred of it... He certainly felt more at home _here_ than he ever had in Grimmauld Place...

...or perhaps it was because this place was Muggle by nature?

Never-the-less, Harry's head was beginning to hurt with all these deep thoughts so he decided to continue exploring on to the only other room to his left, which he presumed was the kitchen.

The kitchen it was indeed and there was even another envelope addressed to Harry on the dust-laden table.

"Merlin's bollocks! More to read? What, didn't give me enough as a student?"

Although he had to admit the level of thoroughness and having some sort of directions helped the situation quite a bit. He set his bags and papers down on the table, disturbing a significant amount of dust in the process. He picked up the new envelope addressed to him and fanned the dust a bit, but that proved to worsen the dust cloud as everything else was covered in thick dust. Harry retreated back into the front sitting room and very gingerly sat down in an armchair and opened the envelope. He adjusted his glasses and his lit wand and began to read.

**Mr. Potter,**

**Welcome to my former humble abode (or shall I call it yours, now?). If all went according to plan, you've received my Last Will & Testament from someone representing the Muggle Solicitor's Office. That document will outline what to do with my possessions (for instance, most of the books are going to Miss Granger), so worry about that as you see fit. I've other documents for you, though. Important documents. Some corporeal, others more cerebral...no...more spiritual in nature. **

**The memories are currently stored in the heirloom chest up in the crawl-space. You'll have to activate them to view them, though I do not possess a Pensieve. Rather, I have modified them so that they behave more interpersonally with the viewer; instead of being an outside witness to the events, the viewer is now the experiencer of the memories, though the viewer's own sense of self and ability to think critically with their own faculties remains intact (to a certain extent - like this, the memories are much more immersive and it is often easier to make mental note of important instances to then analyze them once "woken up"). I must caution that this method of viewing is quite intense (and completely unorthodox as it is the culmination of a near lifetime of experimentation on my part) but it was the only way to preserve these memories and the only way to string them together into a coherent picture of the whole.**

**Why go to such a length to preserve my own memories? you're most likely wondering. They are not merely my own.**

**Harry Potter, I also have memories from both your parents.**


	4. Chapter 4 - Heirlooms

**IV**

Heirlooms

SHOCK was what Harry felt when he read that sentence in Snape's new letter to him.

_**Harry Potter, I also have memories from both your parents.**_

_But, how?!_ Harry wondered, his mouth hanging open.

The letter didn't say and there wasn't too much to the letter after the shocking bit, just detailed instructions on how to mix the catalyst to view the memories, which sounded suspiciously like complicated Potions brewing to Harry.

After staring at the letter with the glow of his wand for some indeterminate amount of time, he had finally lit one of the two candle-filled lamps in the sitting room and had continued to sit staring off for another indefinite length of time.

_This is mental! This has to be some cruel joke! A very elaborate cruel joke, mind you._

Harry's mind kept coming back to _how_. How had Snape set this up? How had Snape gotten a hold of memories from Harry's parents, who were dead long before Snape died? How, how, how?

It just couldn't be possible...

...but Harry had enough experience with Dark Magic to know that with enough sheer determined willpower, nearly anything could be done. So, in his heart, he both mistrusted yet explicitly trusted this magic, this..._offering_.

Eventually Harry got up and busied himself with conjuring some lit candles, charming the kitchen moderately clean and making himself a sandwich from his provisions, a deep frown creasing his forehead. He wondered all the while if this is what he meant when he had wished to know more of his parents. A whisper in his head, _Be careful what you wish for_.

Tuning out any more cautionary disembodied voices, he finished his sandwich.

Harry decided to attempt to tackle the will first and foremost, but opening up the scroll onto the table to find even more tiny, cramped writing just filled Harry with a sense of overwhelming tediousness that he felt his nerves were really not in the mood for. Restless, Harry decided to do what he did best - explore.

The kitchen was the kitchen - little tiny counter space and stove with an old refrigerator that Harry was leary to open up. There seemed to be a water closet, a small pantry, and a door that led to the back and side alley of the house. Not much to see in the kitchen.

Harry charmed clean a bit of the sitting room before going on to explore it. Upon further examination of the bookshelves, which were stuffed with old, leather-bound copies of both Muggle and Magical tomes, he found that there were two hidden doors. One that was to the right of the tiny brick fireplace and across from the front door seemed to lead down into what Harry presumed was the basement. The other door, which was located again behind a bookcase (really it was the door modified to look like/be a part of the bookcase) and to the right of the front door, perpendicular to the basement door, led upstairs to the second story.

Two different staircases to take - above first or below?

Harry really didn't care what was in the basement at this point in time; the newest letter had said that the memories were stored in the crawl-space, which had to be upstairs, due to the very nature of crawl-spaces.

As the electricity did not work, he lit his wand again and ascended the dark stairwell, each step eliciting a _creak!_ as he trod on it. The air was thick, musty with dust and cobwebs, which he brushed aside as he came to stand upon the landing. Harry held his wand aloft - he was in a short, narrow hallway and there seemed to be three doors to his right and a single window to his left, which was shuttered and had thick curtains drawn over it, like the rest of the windows downstairs. It felt like it was the middle of the night, what with it being so dark inside, but Harry was sure it was just nearing evening. He chanced a peek outside, struggling with the stuck shutters briefly, and, sure enough, the sun was beginning to set. He closed up the shutters and curtains and turned around to face the three doors. Harry pointed his wand at the middle door. "_Alohomora_!"

All three doors unlocked themselves. Another incantation was spoken and the doors flung themselves open. Harry waited for the disturbed dust to settle, and for more spiders to scurry into a safe nook or cranny, before peering inside the middle doorway.

That one was just another water closet, however. Harry walked down the hallway to the last door and stepped inside. This room seemed to be just a spare room for storing things - Harry's wand light illuminated an old school trunk, a bookshelf with more stacks of old textbooks and notebooks, a glass case full of odd, most likely Dark Magic objects, and other rather mundane things like spare cauldrons and vials on one side of the room. Most notable, however, was the wall covered with what looked like Muggle LPs - and quite a number of them, too! There were almost as many records as there were books downstairs! Harry reckoned that this room used to be Snape's old room when he was young. He looked at the ceiling, around the perimeter of the room, managing to levitate the massive collection of records for the briefest of moments, and inside the tiny closet for a crawl-space entrance but to no avail.

Back in the hallway, he shined his light at the ceiling in case he had missed any obvious signs of there being an attic, but the ceiling, rather like the walls, was bare.

There was only the room right next to the stairwell to check now.

This room was the largest of the three, obviously being the master bedroom. It was quite sparse in its furnishings, having only a queen-sized bed and night-table next to it to his right, a simple dresser next to the closet on his left, and a tarnished silver, freestanding full-length mirror. Harry got to work scouring for the crawl-space. There was nothing on the ceiling nor behind the dresser or bed; that just left the closet.

Harry opened up the little door adjacent to the door that led out to the hallway and was surprised how large the thin closet was; it ran the whole length of the left wall. He could see the end of the closet only because there wasn't much in it, just a few black robes of varying thread-bareness, a couple of boots, a sparse collection of simple Muggle button-downs and slacks. Harry entered the walk-in closet and made his way to the very back of it where he could see a tiny little door that reminded him of Kreacher's hole-in-the wall cupboard door back at Grimmauld Place.

Two little brass hook-latches kept the door in place and when Harry placed his hands on it, a little jolt shot up his arm that felt like the ghost of the shock you'd get from sticking your fingers in a wall socket and an image of a circle with strange inscriptions flashed briefly in his mind; this was remnants of powerful Dark Magic. There was no denying it as he did this sort of thing for a living now (though the electric feeling was typical, the image that flashed in his mind was not). Nonplussed, he opened it up and a dankly warm and musty smell wafted into his nose. The air was humid and it was pitch dark, though the light from the tip of his wand illuminated a narrow stretch of raftered and insulated gnome-sized hall. Harry could see a lump at the end of the stretch. He made his way towards it.

He tread lightly, as the floorboards were creaky and felt thin and he was sure he was above the sitting room down below. The cotton-candy pink insulation was decrepit and, like the rest of the house, full of dust. Harry was glad he never suffered from allergies. He reached the lump at the end of the crawl-space and, sure enough, it was a rickety old chest with a big iron padlock on it.

_Alohomora_ didn't work.

Harry attempted a couple of other unlocking charms and spells of varying complexity, but nothing worked.

_What did I miss?! I read all his bloody instructions!_ Harry racked his brain.

He suddenly jumped up and hit his head on the low ceiling. After a moment in which the stars he was seeing dissipated, he scrambled back through the narrow space, back into the bedroom and into the hallway, and back downstairs into the kitchen.

There was something in the envelope that the first letter came in - something more weighted than a sheet of parchment, something he hadn't bothered to look at yet.

Sure enough, it was another old skeleton key, and it was made of heavy iron.

Even though it made him quite dizzy, Harry Apparated into the crawl space to shave time.

The key fit into the lock smoothly and snugly but there was the faintest electric-like tickle through his hand and up his arm that Harry again associated with disabled, but a fragmented leftover of Dark Magic - he proceeded with a bit more caution. The locked clicked open and very gingerly, Harry removed it and carefully opened the lid of the ancient school trunk.

_E. Prince_ was embossed on the inside of the lid in faded and flaky goldleaf. Harry felt very small - like when he used to read about pirates at his school library when he lived with the Dursleys and he would imagine himself digging up and opening forgotten chests of loot. He shown his wand-light over the open trunk. Inside, there were no gold or jewels, but what appeared to be treasures of sorts to the late Severus Snape: an old wizarding photograph album, various knick-knacks of tarnished metals, a wand, some books in a language Harry could not identify, two stacks of what appeared to be letters held together with twine, a dark purple velvet satchel with something that _clinked_ and _rattled _inside it, as well as another photograph album which seemed to hold Muggle pictures. At the very bottom of the trunk were two boxes - one had an elaborate crest on it in faded silver filigree and inside were old pieces of jewelry. The last, which he had saved, knowing what it must contain, was in fact addressed to him with a tiny bit of parchment attached with Spello-tape.

Harry's heart began to beat hard against his ribcage. Setting his box gently aside, he packed up the contents of the trunk and closed and locked the lid (not minding the little electric jolt it gave him as he did so). He then de-lit his wand and Apparated back into the sitting room with the box full of memories.

His breathing was fast, and not just because of the instantaneous movement from crawl-space to the downstairs. He sat himself down on the threadbare sofa and set the box on his lap. He opened it up and gasped.

There were more vials than he had anticipated! He counted twelve in total and they were labeled, with miniscule spidery writing, as such: _**Severus, Lily, James, Lily, Severus, James, S/L, James, Lily, Severus, J/L, Severus**_. Harry's fingers brushed lightly over the one labeled _J/L_ and a couple of the others with his parents' names on them and felt light-headed. He repeated the names under his breath so many times that they began to lose their meaning - just seeing his father's first name in the writing he associated with both _The Prince_ and Snape gave him an odd, tight feeling in his chest.

_Why go to such lengths...? Why do all this for...for me?_ Harry couldn't fathom any reason for Snape to do such a thing.

For some reason, Snape's ward-unlocking spell came unbidden into his mind, "_Amor et melle et felle est fecundissimus._" Harry again wondered what it meant. He wished he had an owl so that he could send Hermione a letter and ask her for the phrase's meaning. Instead he tucked the bit of information away in his brain for later.

He really wanted to get right to work brewing this "catalyst", but he knew himself well enough that if he tried to brew a very complicated (and most likely Dark) potion as his nerves were wobbly and as night was approaching, that he would not get very far because he'd botch it somehow. Harry decided to take a look down in the basement - he had a feeling that most of the equipment and ingredients he would need would be down there, if he was lucky; he could set up for brewing tonight and get right to work first thing in the morning.

Taking the box of vials with him, Harry strode over to the door to his left, whispered, "_Lumos_," and descended into the basement.

The crooked, wooden stairs wobbled their way towards a wall and deposited him facing a rather large collection of bottles lying on their sides with their tops pointed out to him. He pulled a few out at random and found that it was a wine collection.

"All these bloody heirloom collections. As if I didn't just get through with Grimmauld Place's heirlooms. At least these ones came with directions." He recalled Sirius' will - curt with not much but a "And Harry gets everything." (with the word "everything" underlined twice) - and couldn't help contrast it with Snape's essay up above on the kitchen table. Another memory surfaced within him in quick succession, this one not his own, but he hazily glimpsed the Great Hall at Hogwarts with students taking their Defense Against the Dark Arts O.W.L.s, one spidery dark-haired boy with a densely written lengthy essay, the other dark-haired fair-looking boy leaning haphazardly back in his chair; old habits died hard Harry supposed.

He turned his attention to the wall to his right and sure enough it had a thin, but tall wooden door mounted in it's middle. He pointed his wand at it and spoke. Two things happened at once - he heard two locks open themselves, one in the door handle and what sounded like a chain unhooking, and there was again a flash of some strange, complicated sigil in his mind that looked similar to the one he had "seen" at the entrance to the crawl-space. He stood for a moment getting his bearings as this after-effect rattled him more than he would have liked, then he pushed the door open.

Harry immediately saw the back wall first; the soft blue glow of the light from his wand glinted off of rows and rows of vials and jars on shelves that took up the whole back wall. Creepy was one word to describe it, though it wasn't wholly unfamiliar as it quite resembled Snape's old classroom. He looked in front of him and was pleased to find a candelabra. He lit it, set the box of memories next to it, and set to work looking for a cauldron, scales, and other various items for brewing potions.

_Trust Snape to keep a whole, ready-to-go Potions Lab in his basement_, Harry thought - all the hardware he could possibly need was in the room and in no time at all he had quite the set-up on the long, sturdy wooden table in the middle of the room. Satisfied with his work, he blew out the candles and was about ready to close the door behind him when he paused for a moment. He turned back around and brought the box of memories with him back into the sitting room.

Harry dragged the box around with him as he constructed and consumed another sandwich, made up a small bed on the couch, and stared at the box with his name still Spello-taped to it, that he had placed directly in front his head on the little low coffee-table, until he fell asleep.


End file.
